The present invention is generally concerned with apparatus for drying ink on a sheet and, more particularly, improvements therein including a louvered infrared light reflecting member.
As shown in the following listed U.S. Patents, it is well known in the art to provide structures for drying and fusing ink markings on sheets. In this connection reference is made to U.S. Pat. Nos.: 3,492,458 issued Jan. 27, 1970 to W. E. White et. al. for a THERMOFUSING DEVICE; 3,772,497 issued Nov. 13, 1973 to Gray et. al. for a FUSER FOR ELECTROSTATIC IMAGE; 4,102,681 issued Jul. 25, 1978 to Draugelis, et. al. for a TRANSFER AND FUSING METHOD; 4,745,432 issued May 17, 1988 to Langdon for a LIQUID INK FUSING SYSTEM; 4,972,225 issued Nov. 20, 1990 to Matsumoto et. al. for a SHEET HEATING DEVICE; and 4,994,642 issued Feb. 19, 1991 to Matsumoto et. al. for A SHEET HEATING DEVICE.
Of the foregoing listed patents the most notable, relevant to the present invention is U.S. Pat. No. 4,994,642, issued to Matsumoto, et. al., which discloses and claims a sheet heating device for heating a sheet while the sheet is being fed, wherein the device generally includes a feed path along which the sheet is fed, a heater unit spaced from the sheet feed path, and a slotted screen protective member located between the sheet fed path and the heating unit. More particularly, the sheet protective member has a plurality of holes defined therein for passing heated air from the heater unit toward the sheet feed path at an angle inclined to the sheet feed path.
Notwithstanding the foregoing Patents, and in particular the structures disclosed therein, Applicants' have found that such structures, to the extent that they are suitable for rapidly drying ink on a moving sheet, are both expensive to construct or purchase and costly to maintain. Accordingly:
an object of the invention is to provide improved apparatus for drying ink carried by a sheet;
another object is to provide apparatus for drying ink on a sheet fed downstream therebeneath; and
another object is to provide apparatus for drying ink on a sheet fed in a predetermined path of travel between ink jet printing structure and sheet stacking structure.